Crusade
by Technical Difficulty
Summary: A body has been found in Paraíso, Mexico. Now the city’s lost electricity. Pilots aren’t returning. Six RE characters converge in a story about a pandemic, a passion rekindled, and the depth of betrayal, sin, and salvation. The nightmare has begun. Again.
1. Fools and Angels

**Full Summary:** Two years after Leon's mission in Europe, Claire finds herself sitting by the tangle of sheets at the side of his bed. It's a quarter past three in the morning. She needs his help. A body has been found in Paraíso, Mexico with strange symptoms: The cells are dead; The body's alive. Now the city has become a virtual Bermuda Triangle. Electricity is down. Pilots aren't returning. Six old forces re-converge for a final clash of the titans in the story about an apocalyptic city, a passion rekindled, the dynamics of friendship and betrayal, and of sin and salvation.  
**The Characters:** Claire Redfield, Leon Kennedy, Ada Wong, Albert Wesker, Chris Redfield, Jill Valentine. Pairings include ChrisxJill and references to StevexClaire and AdaxWesker. I've _mostly_ decided whether Leon will wind up with Claire or Ada, but I'll wait until I'm sure to divulge it.  
**Author's note:** While Americans enjoyed Memorial Day, 10 more soldiers were killed in Iraq. A Saudi detainee at the Guatanamo Bay detention facility in Cuba committed suicide in his cell yesterday afternoon. A Seattle man involved in a fatal shooting entered a plea of insanity. I do have good news though, _señoras y señores:_  
I just saved a bunch of money on car insurance by switching to Geico.  
Just kidding.  
Alright, so it's summer vacation, everyone. I've got all sorts of spare time on my hands. Bon appétit.  
**Disclaimer:** I apologize to any actual city named Paraíso. I own neither Resident Evil nor Geico. But if either CapCom or Bershire Hathaway Inc. happen to be interested, I've got a baby brother I could trade. No? How about a beagle?

* * *

**Crusade.  
**Chapter One: Fools and Angels

The bottle of corn liquor beside the unmade bed was a secret.

Not a very well kept secret, despite the old army blanket covering it that smelt of gin and gunpowder. The sticky rings of day-old alcohol on the kitchen table and the perfume of rotten wheat gave it away.

Claire liked the apartment, despite the bottle of corn liquor. She liked the contemporary squash-colored walls, the sleek bar-style countertop, the rows of glasses hanging by their stems from the ceiling. She loved the wine labels glued like a border around the very top of the walls, the chinoiserie, even the cast-iron lamppost in the corner of the living room with a streetsign nailed to it that read _Rue Bourbon_.

At one point, the entire East-facing wall had been replaced with a windowpane so that the silver light from the needlepoints of a thousand stars haloed the Scarlet O' Hara on the coffee table and made the white sofas gleam, like the bright side of the moon. Straight out the East pane, she could see the scope of the New York City skyline, the way the city lights reflected off the glossy, corporate windows of skyscrapers, the faint glow of yellow streetlamps far below, and of red taillights, too. _Matryoshka _dolls from Afghanistan were lined up on a shelf; a rusting bulletless Beretta was mounted on the wall above what looked like the silhouette of a Tibetan _Brahma _statuary.

Claire stood in the jamb for a moment longer, the broken piece of hanger she'd used to pick the lock open still hot in her hand. The silt from the summer highway had worked its way under her fingernails and between the fillings in her teeth. Every time she pushed back the hair stuck to her lip gloss or to the sweat on her forehead, she smeared monkey grease over her skin. Claire let the door swing shut, switched the coffeepot on in the kitchen. She listened as the machine issued a series of gentle misfires and hisses that sounded like radio static, aware of the scent of diesel, the salty roadway grit inside her mouth and the white fluttering of pigeon wings outside.

There was a damp dishcloth on the countertop that left a wet impression on the Formica when she lifted it. Claire turned the cold water knob at the kitchen faucet slowly, her fingers interrupting the spat of water against the metal sink as she rinsed her hands. Dirt and pieces of crushed gravel dyed the water, swirling around the drain and carrying with it the bits of food that congested the pipes. Claire pressed the terry cloth against her face—icy water, hot night.

She reveled in the dichotomy.

When her skin was raw and clean, she walked down the three steps that led to the living room and through the hallway with the carpet nailed down from wall to wall. Leon's bedroom door was open, his window cracked so that a hot breeze stirred the organdy curtains. Claire sat beside him on the bed, springs creaking almost soundlessly as the mattress depressed beneath her weight. The white bedspread was still creased from the iron, and smelled of bay rum spice aftershave and, much more faintly, of sweat.

She knew to be careful when she woke him. Enough times, she had bolted upright in her own bed, panting and shaking despite the perspiration that made her bangs cling to her sticky skin. Enough times, at least, to know that Leon probably still slept with his custom Red9 tucked beneath his cotton pillowcase. Call it a security blanket. She pulled the elastic out of her hair, tangling her fingers through the satiny tresses, and leaned over him, whispering:

"Leon."

He slept light. It didn't take much to wake him, and then came the part that she loved. His darkish eyelashes batted open and the feline blue eyes were staring at her. _Right _at her.

"Morning," she said with a smile.

He inhaled deep through his nose, just like always, and murmured into the sheets. "Claire."

Claire slapped his shoulder. "Up, Leon." She watched him as he lifted his stubbled cheek a little ways and put it back down on the pillow— just like always. He stayed there for a second, chest rising and falling beneath the slope of the blanket. And then his legs kicked, snarling themselves in the bedsheets, and he sat up. He rubbed his right eye with the heel of his palm, eyebrows raised, forehead wrinkled, chin tucked into his chest.

"What are you doing here?" He asked her, and then mumbled to himself "What time is it?", reaching for the alarm clock on his nightstand.

"It's just after three," she said, squeezing his knee as she stood.

"Three in the _morning_?"

"Three in the morning," Claire confirmed. "I figured you're probably still hung over, so there's coffee brewing."

Leon exhaled a short, wry laugh, licking his dry lips. "Shrewd."

Claire laughed. "Get dressed," she said, and retreated to the kitchen where the aroma of Arabica overpowered the stink of motor oil and filth.

Bedsheets rustled. She heard the light sound of his bare feet hitting the hardwood floors and the jingling-sliding of a dresser drawer opening. When he stepped into hallway a few minutes later, he was wearing tactical pants and the white racerback tank that usually fit under his lycra uniform. His skin was still slightly brown from his mission in Santorini, the muscles of his arms aerodynamic and delineated with full, knotty veins. She heard the doorknob to the bathroom rattle, the squeak of the faucet knobs, tailed by the sudden rush of water and the gulping sound of the sink drain.

"Coffee?" She called.

"Double double," came the disembodied reply.

If Leon had mugs, Claire couldn't find them, so she poured the java into champagne flutes and stirred the milk and sugar in, teaspoon clinking against the sides of the glass.

When he came out, wiping bits of shaving cream off his jaw with a hand towel, and saw the wineglasses, he raised an eyebrow.

"Couldn't find your coffee cups," she said.

Leon reached for the body of the flute, snapping his hand back when the heat conducted by the glass scalded his fingers. He put the burnt index and forefingers in his mouth boyishly, shooting her a reproachful glare.

"Careful. It's hot," she warned.

He gave Claire a look. "What's up?" He asked, picking up the flute again, by the stem this time.

Claire picked the dirty dishrag out of the kitchen sink where she'd left it, ran it over the slick bartop. The counter was already bright and clean, but she had been a bartender back in '99, and old habits died hard. "What do you mean?"

"What's up," Leon repeated, "What's going on? What are you doing here?"

"Can't a girl visit her friend anymore?"

"At quarter past three in the morning?" He drank his coffee as though it was tequila, she noticed, knocking it back fast as she poured it. The fact that he kept whiskey by his bed still bothered her a little, but at the end of the day she knew she had a vice or two to keep the nights dreamless.

"I just got off the interstate."

"From where? Where've you been, Claire?"

She cocked a rebellious eyebrow. "Vegas, baby."

"Oh, Christ. Last thing you need's Sin City."

She pinched his cheek. "Ever the boy scout, Leon."

Leon pressed his palms together, praying-style, tilting his forehead against his fingertips. "Advil. Second pantry from the left," he said.

Claire opened the cupboard, eying cumin and rosemary, yellow boxes of baking soda, stoppered extracts, and sleeping pills. She set the nearly-empty bottle of painkillers near his elbow. "I hear Advil's bad for you, you know," she informed him. "Thins the blood." When he rolled his eyes, she said again, "What I hear."

"So. You just up and leave Sin City, or d'you have a reason?"

"That's proprietary information. You'd probably arrest me if you knew."

Leon dry swallowed two pills and snapped the lid back on the pain relievers. He blinked, took in a deep, shuddering breath. "Something come up?"

Claire slung the dishcloth over her shoulder and leaned forward over the counter. "I guess I got spooked."

Leon looked up at her. "You, spooked?"

Claire shrugged with her eyebrows.

"Claire." When she didn't respond, he ran a hand over his clean-shaven chin, and she noticed that he'd nicked himself with the razor, a tiny fleck of dried blood on his jaw. "It hasn't got anything to do with that Steve kid, has it?"

"No, nothing to do with Steve," she said, twisting her hand through her hair in a nervous idiosyncrasy. It had gotten longer, Leon noted, a ways past her shoulders now. "Not Steve," she repeated. "It's Chris."

"Chris. Redfield? Chris Redfield, your brother?"

"He called me. He's in Mexico."

Leon waited for the other shoe to drop, but Claire was quiet. The buzz of fly wings vibrating near the glass wall interrupted the silence. "Great story," Leon said, propping his foot up on the I-beam of the stool and readjusting his position. "Tell it again?"

Claire threatened to rat-tail him with the rag, and Leon held a hand up in front of his face. "No backtalk, wise guy," she admonished. "Turns out everything's down in Paraíso, the city he called from."

"What the hell's that supposed to mean, 'Everything's down'?"

"I mean, everything is down," she said, shaking the dishcloth straight and then re-folding it into a square. She started working it in circles on the bar again, so that she'd have something to do with her hands. Claire had the feeling if she didn't keep them preoccupied, they'd start trembling. "They haven't got electricity, phone lines are down, pilots haven't been returning. Everything is out." She scrubbed at what looked like a dried drop of Karo syrup on the enamel. "It's like the damn Bermuda Triangle there, Leon."

"What was Chris doing there?" He asked. The city light bounced off the silky sheen of sweat on his back and shoulderblades as he shifted.

"He didn't say," Claire said. "He wouldn't tell me, but I thought about it. I might know."

"And?"

"I went online. They have these Web sites that scan the newspapers, put them in digital archives, things like that."

"And?" He repeated.

"And I went through the papers. I think it was called the Paraíso Periódico or something. At first, I was only looking at things that happened the week before I got the call, but when I didn't find anything, I had to check some of the more recent ones. I found an article."

"Do you have it on you?"

"No, it costs ten cents to print stuff out at the library. I got the gist of it, though Someone found a body."

"Like a dead body? What about it?"

"Well, they said it was a dead body. At first. Then they realized there was still electricity in the brain. Metabolic processes still functioning. Synapses firing."

"So he was still alive?"

"Yeah, only he wasn't. His cells were decaying and he didn't have a pulse. It whipped the town up into a religious frenzy. People were citing dead saints whose bodies supposedly never rotted."

"They thought he was a saint?"

"Some of them. Only the exact opposite. I mean, the saints were dead and didn't rot. This guy was living and decaying."

"Was that the only article you found?"

"Yeah. Three days before Chris' call. It's been another week since then."

"Why haven't there been more?"

"I'll tell you _why_. Because the newspapers are down, too. They haven't published anything since they held the presses for that article."

"Christ." He looked up at Claire, just able to make out the cream-colored planes of her face, the short, Grecian nose, the dark hair tumbling down her back. "It could be nothing," he said. "After awhile, everything starts sounding like a bump in the night."

"Could be." She held his stare steady.

"It isn't nothing, is it?"

"No."

There were a few quiet beats. They could hear the wail of sirens on the streets below.

Leon's teeth flashed white in a small, sad smile. "I've got that saying stuck in my head all of a sudden," he said softly. "How does it go? 'Fools rush in where angels fear to tread'. Who said it, again?"

"Pope," said Claire. "Alex Pope."

He made a low, inarticulate sound.

Claire picked up her wineglass and raised it above her head in a mock-toast. "Well, I guess here's to fools," she said, trying to lessen the pall that had suddenly dropped over their conversation.

But Leon was looking off to the side, to the bulletless Beretta that he'd taken from Raccoon City (1) as a token---how had he put it again? _"As a token---to remind myself that lightning never strikes the same place twice, maybe," _he'd told her, sunlight glinting off his grin as he nailed it in place. She could only imagine what he was thinking now, that it was less a token and more of an ever-present reminder that history has a way of repeating itself. She reached out a hand, felt his fingers encircle hers in the darkness, felt him lean his head against her forearm, stricken with the memories of another city, not too different from this one, and another time not long enough ago.

And right then, she didn't have to try to imagine:

She knew exactly how he felt.

* * *

Nighttime again. 

A bartender stands barefoot on crowned streets that are still warm from the sun, washing day-old beer as stale as the air off the sidewalk with a pistol-grip hose. Bunch grass grows up between the cracks in the pavement. The water makes a splattering sound against the pitch and the tang of old alcohol succumbs to the scent of tar oils. The heat is as sultry as the Papaver skirts the _muchachas _wear, pregnant with the mandolins of street musicians and the _graznidos _of yellow taxis. The colorful nainsook laundry drying on clotheslines is motionless. The air hums with streetlights and the crystalline wings of _los cigarras_.

Inside the room with orange walls, three fireflies bump against the sides of the rinsed honey jar in the corner. Every once in awhile, their strobes of bioluminescence illuminate the bedchamber. According to the folded newspaper beside the dirty cot, there's a half moon tonight, but the room's only window has been painted black with acrylic.

It smells of cactus blossoms and tobacco. There is a pile of Kevlar and raw silk on the foot of the bed. There is lace on the muslin sheets.

There are guns on top of the lace.

A _querido _is sitting on a folding chair with her hands between her knees. Her legs are bare, and she is wearing a red dress. When she was a little _niño_ in China, she'd knelt at the feet of a Xiāaanshēeeng and he'd told her about red. The red of passion and brides and anger and power and bloodshed. But the _querido_, the darling, she wears red for two very simple reasons:

One, because it is the color that everyone sees first in the light;

And _dos_, because no one sees it at all in the dark. (2)

The strobing light from the fireflies in the corner has a stop-animation effect on her movements, telling her story in little split-second snapshots. By the tiny gold flashes of light, she resembles a Dresden doll. Her skin is as delicate as bone china and nearly as white. There are butterflies on her dress sewn in embroidery and glass beads. They signify chrysalis. Metamorphoses. Change.

Darkness.

With the next flash of light, her eyes are open. They are _avellana_, hazel, strikingly beautiful for a _muchacha _of her descent.

Darkness again. The firefly light shows her slender hands sliding a widow's blade between her thigh and the nylon of the black garter strap.

Darkness. Then she is spinning the barrel of her six-shooter magnum shut. Tucking the piece of paper with the black-inked coordinates into the cup of her bra. Standing.

When the fireflies wink on again, the room is _vacío_. The painted window is open.

And she is gone.

* * *

**(1):** The Beretta nailed to the wall of Leon's Apartment is the same one Ada dropped in Raccoon City just before the velocity of Anna Birkin's shot forced her off the bridge to her alleged death. The fact that the gun wasn't loaded was important to Leon in the game--in his mind, it was proof of her potential for good.  
**(2):** Last summer, I played manhunt a little after sunset. One of my friends was wearing a red sweatshirt, and I remember I'd laughed at her because I thought she'd make a quick target. Turns out, it's a trick she learned from her father, who'd served in Vietnam. Red is the hardest color for the human eye to discern in blackness. Try it sometime.  
**PS:** I will now use subliminal messages to make you want to review. Well, (review) that wraps up my first published fanfiction. It's summer, (pleasereview) but I have remarkably little free time. I can probably bang out (reviewreviewreview) another chapter reasonably soon. You guys can actually help me out big time (please?) if you'd just let me know which you prefer--LeonxAda or LeonxClaire. Thanks! 


	2. Three Sheets To The Wind

**Full Summary: **Two years after Leon's mission in Europe, Claire finds herself sitting by the tangle of sheets at the side of his bed. It's a quarter past three in the morning. She needs his help. A body has been found in Paraíso, Mexico with strange symptoms: The cells are dead; The body's alive. Now the city has become a virtual Bermuda Triangle. Electricity is down. Pilots aren't returning. Six old forces re-converge for a final clash of the titans in the story about an apocalyptic city, a passion rekindled, the dynamics of friendship and betrayal, and of sin and salvation.  
**The Characters: **Claire Redfield, Leon Kennedy, Ada Wong, Albert Wesker, Chris Redfield, Jill Valentine. Pairings include ChrisxJill and references to StevexClaire and AdaxWesker. I've _mostly_ decided whether Leon will wind up with Claire or Ada, but I'll wait until I'm sure to divulge it.  
**Disclaimer:** I don't own Resident Evil. But ask me again in a few months, I'm working on it.

* * *

**Crusade.  
**Chapter Two: Three Sheets To The Wind

Mexico was quietest in the early morning. Children, _niños, _played in the dirt streets, walking bright bicycles with dusty tires or chasing pigeons with sticks. A _vagabundo _was sleeping with his back against a pueblo wall, a pair of sneakers knotted by their shoelaces around his neck and a _vihuela_ guitar clutched in one hand. It was barely seven o' clock in the morning, and already the dewdrops had dried on the thermometers hanging by the windows of the houses.

It was going to be another scorcher.

Leon had been sitting in a booth near the storefront of the hotel restaurant for about a half-hour when Claire slid into the seat across from him, her hair still wet from the shower. It hung in delicate strands that curlicued and stuck to her cheeks, darkening her pink-and-black motorcyclist jacket with water.

"I didn't know you spoke Spanish," she said as he let the bottom half of the newspaper he was reading drop open, grazing the checkered tablecloth. He snapped the paper once, reaching for the cup of _caf____é __de olla_ at his elbow.

"I don't, not really. I picked up a word or two in Lisbon a couple years ago," he said. He took a sip of the coffee. "I get the feeling this article's got something to do with that city— Paraíso, I think?—in the back, here. I can't understand enough of it, though."

"Let me see."

Leon folded the newspaper in half longitudinally, placing it on the table and using the side of his palm to crease it. "There," he said, pointing to a narrow little column that read "AQUÍ ALÍ SER MONSTRUOS."

Claire studied the column, a frown dimpling her forehead. "'Here there be monsters'," she read aloud. "Los Milanos, Mexico. ___Policía _in Los Milanos have responded to at least seven different complaints of 'violent assault' at the outskirts of the city. Although no one was hurt seriously, thirty-three-year-old Magdalena Rivera is apparently being treated for superficial injuries at the local hospital. Doctors say that while the injuries resemble human bite marks, the pressure required to make the marks greatly exceeded the 150 pounds per square inch that the average adult male can exert. Rivera says the assailant was humanoid, but moved in a drunken way, falling and staggering after her. Police suspect the culprit may be a young Siamang monkey that recently escaped from Mexico City's Chapultepec Zoo, and would like to remind the citizens of Los Milanos that Siamangs are an endangered species and should not be fired upon. If you sight the animal, you should notify the authorities and maintain a safe distance, as the specimen may have contracted rabies."

"Rabies." Leon snorted.

"Well, a stampeding rabid monkey is the logical conclusion. Compared to what you're about to suggest, I mean."

"The lady. The Magdalena Ri-Riv—you know, that lady that was bit."

"Yeah?"

"She's infected."

They stared at each other for a few moments. The door to the hotel cafe swung open, and the bell over the door jingled as it snapped shut on spring-wired hinges.

"We could quarantine her," Claire said in a flat voice.

"Where? On what authority?"

She shook her head.

"We don't have a cure," he reminded her.

"Maybe," she opened her mouth to say more, then closed it again. Claire turned her face toward the window where a woman was walking past, her bright skirt flapping in the breeze as she carried a bucket of tomatoes to the farmer's market on her hip. She cupped her chin in her hand, fingers curling over her mouth so that her voice was muffled when she agreed quietly, "Yeah.."

"We have to make sure, before we—We have to see her and make sure."

"And if it is? What we think it is?"

"Then we have to remember that seven hundred thousand people died in Raccoon City."

She took her hand away from her mouth and met his stare again, her eyes darting over his irises, his cheekbones, his lips and chin. "Just think about what you're saying."

It was Leon's turn to look away, his cheeks hot. "I don't like it, either," he admitted.

"But?"

"But I've done a lot of stuff I don't like," he said.

"I'm suddenly really, really hoping we find a rabid monkey."

The waitress limped over, sweat beading her upper lip as she pulled a notepad from a pocket in her apron. "¿_Algo para usted_, _señora_? Some breakfast?"

"No, _gracias,_" Claire said. "Leon." She waited until he was looking at her before she asked, "How are we going to evacuate the city?"

"I don't know. We'll think on the way." He stood up, one hand on his jeans pocket while his other hand dug inside for change. "Get your stuff." He lifted a saucer, put a crushed and scotch-taped five dollar bill beneath it.

She picked up the coffee mug Leon had left on the table; drops of java had rolled down the porcelain sides of the cup and congealed in a ring on the white and red cloth. "Los Milanos?" She said, staring at him over the rim as she took a sip.

"We've got to see—you, know—" he looked down at the article for help. "R-Rivera. The lady," he said as he pulled on his thick bomber jacket, his hands on the collar of the coat as he lifted it and readjusted it. His back was to Claire when he stopped, turning his head slightly to the side so that she could just make out the top of his profile over the sheepskin-lined neck of the jacket. His eyes were lowered as he said, "I have to know."

& & &

The black leather seats of the SofTail were hot, just like the air inside Claire's spare motorcycle helmet, when Leon climbed onto the back of the bike. Leon had seen a commercial airplane crash into the side of the Raccoon City Police Department's Second Precinct. It had taken only thirteen minutes for the flames to reach the gas tank. The passengers had screamed for only thirteen minutes—Not long at all, most people would say. The passengers of flight 479 would disagree.

"_No," _Leon had said in the dark kitchen of his apartment, the strobe of the microwave's digital clock lighting up his face, _"No planes. No helicopters, nothing that flies."_

"_Haven't you ever seen Superman?" _Claire had teased. _"'I certainly hope this little incident doesn't put you off flying,'" _she'd quoted Christopher Reeve, her eyebrows furrowed as she struck a heroic pose. _"'Statistically speaking, of course, it's still the safest way to travel.'" _

The air inside the helmet smelt like stale polystyrene, and Leon flipped the visor open, his undershirt clinging to his skin while beads of sweat rolled down his back and dampened the waistband of his pants. The muscles of his arms were rock-hard as he wrapped them around her waist. Claire twisted the key in the ignition of the bike, revving the motor.

"Claire," Leon said. "Claire!"

Claire turned her head to the side to indicate she was listening, using one gloved hand to knock her visor open. Perspiration already darkened the strings of hair around her face. "Yeah?" She asked, lips pulled away from her teeth, nose wrinkled, eyes squinting against the sun.

"Where'd you learn Spanish, anyway?"

Claire laughed, facing forward. "Impressed?"

"Yes. Where?"

"I learned a bit at school, but it didn't really click until juvie," she said, pulling the visor shut again.

"_Juvie_?"

"Yeah, there's this one guy there only spoke Spanish. He taught me pretty much everything I need to get by."

"Claire, _Juvenile Hall?_ When the hell were you in Juvenile Hall?"

Her hand twisted the gas lever, the glottal roar of the engine almost eclipsing her muffled voice. "I don't know. When I was sixteen, seventeen? Grand Theft Auto, if you'll believe it."

Leon stared off to the side, where two sheets of printer paper were taped up to the barbershop window, broadcasting the words "SICK TODAY" in black magic marker. "You know, I do."

"If I had known motorbikes count as GTA," she shouted over the roar of the engine. "I guess I should count myself lucky the judge didn't know about—"

"Just so you know, anything you say can and will be used against you in the court of law," Leon reminded her.

"I'd shut up and hold on, if I were you," Claire suggested, pushing the kickstand up with the toes of her boot. The bike's tires spun and fishtailed, raising a cloud of dust that hung in the air, suspended against the backdrop of the painfully blue sky—the only evidence that the two Americans had been there at all, except the impression of the motorcycle's tires in the hard earth. And later that day, when the hot wind nudged the shifting sands, even that faded away into nothing.

* * *

Chris Redfield was leaning up against the wall of the windowless bank vault. The bluish light of his crank-powered tactical flashlight lit only his lower lip, the tips of his cheekbones, and his brow, with the tiny smudge of gunpowder above the left eyebrow. The heat inside the vault was like a third presence; it sugarcoated his skin with sudor, made the room seem suffocatingly small. Chris' fingers trembled with exhaustion as he popped the cylinder of his Beretta Laramie open and slid out the bullets. He liked to count them from time to time, the bullets. 

_One_.

Jill was across the room from him, the lock of brass-colored hair stuck to the corner of her mouth flickering as she exhaled. Paraཽso had been his idea. They'd been waiting on a round of drinks at one of those seedy bars, the kind that still had yellowing pictures of Elvis nailed up everywhere. The radio had been playing, quiet, so that they could only catch snatches of music in between the conversations and short cascades of liquors. Coming with him had been her idea. At first he hadn't liked it—had set his scotch and soda back on the table and smiled and stared down at his hands. But she was insistent and, moreover, she was right. Though now that she was sleeping and he could study her alabaster skin and delicate frame, he had to wonder if there wasn't another, more personal reason he'd let her tag along.

_Two_.

He'd found the yellow envelope pushed through the gap between his apartment door and the ground. There hadn't been any markings on it, and when he slid his forefinger beneath the envelope's flap and opened it, there had been only a small newspaper clipping inside. From the ___Paraíso __Periódico_. Or something like that. The article had been in Spanish, but he'd lived near the border for a couple years and spoke pretty well. Well enough to understand the gravity of the situation.

_Three_.

Then the helicopter ride to ___Paraíso_. Even from five hundred feet, it was easy to see the smoke, and the white flicker of papers scuffling over the streets. The searchlights had glinted off the shards of windshieldsand windows, illuminating twisted pieces of rebar and the smolder of fires. Setting up shop in the bank had been Jill's idea. The door, she'd said, frowning as she readjusted her grip on the attaché case. The door would make the bank impenetrable. A perfect base of operations.

_Four_.

After things had gone wrong, he'd managed to get a call out to Claire on a payphone. There had been something painfully surreal about feeding coins to the machine and listening to the recorded voice of the operator while thick white smoke and papers skittered over the ruined streets. A telephone line had sparked on the ground nearby. He hadn't been able to give her too much information before the operator had asked him to please deposit eighty-seven cents—or, as she'd put it _por favor deposite ochenta y siete centavos_. But Claire was clever enough to know not to alert the authorities. Umbrella had a finger in every pie, and the opportunity for the rebellion to gather evidence, samples, and, with luck, even an antivirus couldn't be passed up. Then Jill had shouted something, and he'd dropped the phone, receiver knocking against the glass wall of the darkened phone booth as he sprinted away.

_Five._

Only five bullets; he'd used one already. In the corner, Jill's eyelashes were twitching, eyes moving beneath her closed lids. Chris looked up at her. Then he slipped the bullets back into the cylinder and spun it shut, setting the gun aside and crawling across the room to where she lay sleeping.

"Jill."

Her hands were clutching the jacket balled up like a pillow beneath her head so tightly the knuckles were white. There was a dimple on her forehead between her eyebrows.

"_Jill._"

He touched her shoulder. There was a blur of white skin, and then her fingers were wrapped tightly around his wrist, Lady Slipper-blue eyes wide in the darkness.

"Chris?"

The blue flashlight cast long shadows over Chris' tired face, rimed with soot. Outside, black smoke from week-long fires clotted the skies and clung close to the scorched pavement. Wind picked up glowing embers and scuttled them across the macadam streets until they became ensnared in the bunch grass growing in the cracks of the sidewalk. The embers burnt the grass black, and smoldered red, like little magma rivers snaking through the black. Crushed pieces of metal and splinters of glass made a mosaic on the streets. A car alarm was sounding in the distance. Much nearer, Chris could hear the buzz of flies. The cloyingly sweet stench of rot hung in the air, around the crooked streetsigns and shattered lamplights. And amidst this ruin and darkness, Chris smiled, and said:

"Good morning."

Jill's fingertips stuck slightly to Chris' skin as she released his wrist. She blinked a few times, real fast, staring with violent intensity at the floor between them. "I'm sorry," she said, running her fingers through her short hair. "I had a nightmare."

Chris exhaled a short laugh. "You're _living _the nightmare, Jill. What did you dream about?"

She pushed herself into a sitting position against the vault wall, rubbing her left arm. "The mansion."

"The mansion. The Arklay Mountains?"

Jill nodded, rolling her shoulders so her back was pressed ramrod-straight against the vault. She tilted her head against the wall, ivory neck exposed. "Yeah," she said in a whisper.

He sighed and stared off to the side. The light, delicate and blue, glowed off his profile, and Jill could see his Adam's apple bobbing as he swallowed. "What's wrong with us, Jill?"

Jill watched him from between her blonde lashes, head still inclined back. "Me and you, us?"

"Me, you," Chris said, stealing a look at her. "Leon, Claire, Barry. I mean, why are we here, Jill? I thought—I don't know. I thought the burnt child feared the flame, or whatever. Do you know what I mean?"

Jill rolled her head to the side. " Here we are, Chris, it's been, what—seven years? Eight. Eight years, yeah, and after all that time we still don't have our white picket fence. No happily ever after. Nothing that we fought so hard to survive for." She gave a short, bitter laugh. "Actually, it's been eight years and we haven't even escaped that goddamn mansion. It's bad enough to live with it every night. Now we're living it during the day, too. And we chose it this way."

Chris dropped his head and stared at his combat boots. "I guess we're not children. We're like...moths. Masochists. Just can't seem to stay away from the fire."

Jill was still looking to the corner. "I'm hungry," she said simply.

Chris' shoulders jumped as he gave a humorous little "hmpf." "That's a dangerous thing to say around here."

She peeled herself off the wall and crawled over to the rucksack. "I'm serious. Aren't you hungry?"

"No, I ate while you were sleeping. We've got some jerky left."

Jill pulled the drawstrings of the bag open. "I hate jerky. I want eggs."

Chris stood and crossed to where Jill was sitting. "We don't have eggs," he said, staring at the rations.

"And I want toast," she said, biting into a piece of tough meat and jerking her head to the side. She chewed thoughtfully. "With butter."

"Well, we've _got _jerky," Chris said as he picked up one of the provisions and looked at it. "and we're lucky to have that," he said, throwing it savagely back into the sack. He sat down with a groan, sliding the straps of his shoulder holsters off so that they hung like suspenders around his knees.

"We're going to have to leave for more food soon," Jill sighed. "After a week of this dried shit, I'm starting to think _they_ have the right idea," she said, nodding her head toward the zombies outside.

Chris raised his eyebrows. "I think I'll be sleeping with my gun in my hand from now on," he said. Their laughter was loud and unnatural in the darkness, and when it finished, the silence seemed even more complete.

She smiled, but her eyes were glistening. "Chris, I'm tired."

"Go back to sleep. I'll do a double watch shift, see if we can get in touch with Claire again, or Barry."

"No, I mean I'm tired. Of this," she said, waving her hand at the vault, the city.

"We have to finish setting the charges, Jill. We can't let the infection spread—imagine if the _world _was just another Raccoon City. We've got to blow this city to hell. Destroy the virus once and for all."

"There's not going to _be _a 'once and for all,' Chris, this isn't chicken pox."

"We can't let it spread."

"For all we know, it already has! For all we know, it's reached the border, and we're sitting in a bank vault, the last two people alive, and trying to save the world."

"Jill, look at me. _Look at me._" He put a finger under her chin and tilted her head up toward him. "We're going to be okay."

She snorted.

"Do you believe me?"

Jill looked away briefly. He could see her chest rising and falling slowly, see the smudge of blood on her neck where fingers had grazed her. Then she turned her eyes toward his, and he was surprised to see the fierceness, the jadedness, and the resolution in those Beryl-pale irises. They were the eyes of a survivor, and he realized with a jolt that he'd seen that very look before, the first time he'd looked in a mirror after Arklay.

It had scared him shitless.

Jill opened her mouth, lips sticking together a little, but it was awhile before she could find the words. "I believe we'll live, Chris," she said quietly. Then she dropped her gaze to her hands, stained with blood, dirt, and ashes. Judging by the way she was frowning with her eyes all narrowed like that, Chris knew what she was thinking about: an old estate with doors that opened on tarnished brass pintles and gunpowder, screams, and decay. Then Jill shook her head slightly, and the expression on her face broke his heart.

"But I don't think we're ever going to be okay."

* * *

The door is thrown open so that the cool light from the hallway makes the room's number "513" glow gold. The light that spills, rectangular-shaped, through the open doorway illuminates the metal railing of a hospital bed, a corner of starched cotton sheets, and tiled floors. The window is open, and curtains billow so gently they might be in slow-motion. 

There is a tiny snap, and suddenly a three-pronged hook is gleaming on the windowsill. There is another sound, like the kind a retractable dog leash makes when the dog suddenly runs far ahead, or the kind a tape measurer makes when it reels in the tape. Then the curtains balloon inward and a silhouette lands on the windowsill, her feet nearly silent as she crouches against the bright moon.

She steps down from the sill, her stilettos clicking against the tile. There is a whisper of satin as her red dress swirls around her ankles. She gives the bed a sideways glance, picking up the clipboard at its foot and scanning the first page. The woman lifts the page, then the next, dark eyes flitting over the papers, at once interested and indifferent. The board clatters back onto the counter.

She hesitates, looking over her narrow shoulder at the bizarrely dead hospital hallway behind her. Then she closes door 513, carefully, so that the latch catching won't wake the patient. She slides her Blacktail from the holster on her bare thigh and puts her free hand on the railing, leaning over the bed and watching the gentle breathing of patient 513. The sound as she snaps the safety off is almost nonexistent.

With the silencer, the sound of the bullet firing is even quieter.

A few minutes later, when she swings her legs over the sill and sits in the moonlight, there is something unpleasant in the air. A burning smell, and underneath that, a far more sinister odor that has always reminded her of pennies. There is a _drip_, as though a faucet somewhere has not been turned off properly. The woman in the red dress glances at the bare arm that has fallen through the bars of the bed railing.

In the moonlight, the paper bracelet around the patient's wrist practically glows with the words:

"Magdalena Rivera."

* * *

**A/N: (**This week, I'll be using Reverse Psychology to encourage readers to review:) Do not review. Reviews are very bad. I have no use for criticism. Do not review. Okay, we're golden!**  
Ada Adore:** Thanks. Dialogue's one of those tricky things that I've never had a good handle on, so your review means a lot. When I first played Resident Evil 2, I loved the "La Femme Nikita" feel of Ada's character, and I've always wanted to try my hand at a piece with her. I'm hoping to put more of her into later chapters. In the meantime...didn't you write "Hope"? I just got around to reading it, and I was floored. I think my favorite part of the story was the character interactions, especially between Leon and Mei or Ada and Mei. I thought they really spoke about human condition. Maybe we'll see a sequel?  
**Alaska Kennedy:** I'm glad you like the beginning. (It seemed pretty wonky when I read through it the next day.) I hope you like this installment.  
**Coon66:** Thanks. There's a lot more enmity between LeonxClaire fans and LeonxAda fans than I realized. I guess I'll have to try to appease both.  
**L.M. Avalon:** Actually, the support for LeonxAda took me by surprise, since most gamers were LeonxClaire fans last time I stopped by Resident Evil fanfiction. At any rate, it was a real relief to see someone who knows how to capitalize and punctuate their sentences, so thanks for the review.  
**Claire Burnside267:** Thanks. Since I read your review, I went back and started Code Veronica over, looking for some loophole or way to get Steve back in the game. If it works with the continuity, maybe I'll try my hand at writing Steve—might be fun :p  
**Tilly Blaker:** Thanks for the compliment. I want to explore the LeonxAdaxClaire triangle, maybe in the third or fourth chapter. Hope you keep reading.  
**Major-003:** Haha! I knew I took Psych for a reason. Somehow, subliminal messages failed at convincing Ken Kutaragi to donate a PlayStation 3 to me. One can only hope.  
**SiNicaLLY diSTuRbEd**


	3. The Children of Fatima

**Full Summary: **Two years after Leon's mission in Europe, Claire finds herself sitting by the tangle of sheets at the side of his bed. It's a quarter past three in the morning. She needs his help. A body has been found in Paraíso, Mexico with strange symptoms: The cells are dead; The body's alive. Now the city has become a virtual Bermuda Triangle. Electricity is down. Pilots aren't returning. Six old forces re-converge for a final clash of the titans in a story about an apocalyptic city, a passion rekindled, the dynamics of friendship and betrayal, and of sin and salvation.  
**The Characters: **Claire Redfield, Leon Kennedy, Ada Wong, Albert Wesker, Chris Redfield, Jill Valentine. Pairings include ChrisxJill and references to StevexClaire and AdaxWesker. I've _mostly_ decided whether Leon will wind up with Claire or Ada, but I'll wait until I'm sure to divulge it.  
**Author's Note: **Coarse language and very minor adult themes in this installment. I know it took awhile to produce chapter three, but I'm pretty satisfied with the final draft. Or I will be, at least, until it's posted. Robert Wrigley once said that all artists will eventually walk away because the poem (or in this case, story) because the story that interests them the most is none of them that they have written, but the one that they will write next. Or something like that. At any rate, Happy Halloween. An apple a day will keep the doctor away, unless it has a razorblade in it.  
**Disclaimer:** I don't own Resident Evil. But ask me again in a few months, I'm working on it.

* * *

**Crusade**.  
**Chapter Three:** The Children of Fatima

_The odor of rust was not unlike blood. It infected the I-beams of the bridge at Raccoon City, the bolts and washers of the construct. From somewhere out of sight, lights shone through the bridge's iron girders, striping Ada's still body with slats of bright and dark. She had been supine, her long legs tangled up in each other and her feet bare, when Wesker had found her. One arm was twisted behind her back, the other lying slack over her waist, where the red of her dress was darker than it ought to have been. _

"Black gloves again," she says as she lies on her side on top of the bedspread. She is propped up on her left elbow, her hand lost in the dark hair that falls wildly around her porcelain face. The other arm is resting atop her side, folded at the elbow, over her waist so that her slender fingers can play with the cambric sheets. She is watching the way the light illuminates Wesker's shirtless back as he sits at the edge of the bed, the ridge of his spine rippling as he bends to lace up his boots. He straightens with a short exhalation, claps his black-gloved hands on his knees, and says:

"Business."

Ada's gaze darts over to the glass nightstand, where his revolver is lying upon its own reflection. "You know what they say about all work and no play."

"I think last night qualified as play," he says. He twists to get a better look at her, his bright eyes dropping pointedly to the baby-doll strap that has slipped off the fragile line of her shoulder before meeting her stare.

She arches an eyebrow, but says nothing as he turns around again. One hand reaches for the revolver, and she listens to the sound of the chamber being popped, then spun back into place before the gun disappears into a nylon holster.

_The blood had been sticky and cold when he'd rubbed it between his fingers, and her normally caramel skin was white as a paper crane. Though weak, her voice was still smooth like milk and honey when she'd said, "You're late."  
_

_ He'd raised an eyebrow. "And you failed."  
_

_Her body shook with rattling coughs, and there was something red at the corner of her lips. "Shocking," she'd said dryly, when they had subsided. "I hadn't noticed."  
_

_ He'd clicked a penlight on. "Open your eyes."  
_

_ Even as she was dying, the color of her irises was delicious._

The floor tiles are cold against the soles of her feet when Ada swings her legs over the edge of the bed; as she stands, her pale white hand reaches for the red dress hanging from the bedpost. "Do you want the S.T.A.R.S. taken care of today?" she asks. The baby-doll falls around her bare ankles with a whispering sound.

Wesker pulls a spandex shirt over his head and runs his fingers through his blonde hair before replying. "Not today," he says as he unfolds his glasses and slides them on. "I'm more interested in Miss Redfield today."

She looks up at him while she steps into the evening gown, watching him shrug on a tactical vest. "Claire?" she says.

"She's in Los Milanos. She's not alone."

She zips up the back of the dress and crosses the room barefoot to where her stilettos lie in a confused tangle of black straps and heels. "The call Chris placed was successful?"

"Indeed. Claire Redfield arrived several days ago with an old…acquaintance of yours." When he is answered only by the creak of the bedsprings as the mattress depresses under her slight weight, he presses on. "Leon Kennedy."

_Her pupils were dilated, even in the beam of the penlight, and he knew that she could not see him. Somewhere high above, a computerized voice informed him that the facility was about to self-destruct. She had failed.  
_

_ He tried to remind himself that he did not need her._

She feels his stare on the top of her head while she pulls the straps of the shoes tight against her feet. "I thought he died a couple years ago," she grunts.

If his tone was not accusatorial earlier, it certainly is when he says, "So did I." She stands, the silk hem falling around her knees as she walks to the vanity mirror. "It works to our advantage at the moment, but the time will come when he has outlived his usefulness. I trust at that point you can finish the job?"

Ada cocks her head, watching her image as she slides her earrings in. "They say the third time's the charm."

Her hands are clutching her elbows when his image appears in the mirror, directly behind her own , the artificial light decorating his high cheekbones and pale lips. "I have disturbing intelligence that Krauser was not dead when Leon left him," he says quietly. She cannot read his eyes behind the sunglasses, but his words speak for themselves: "You don't seem surprised to hear this."

"I don't shock easily." She tries to turn and face him, but suddenly his hands are on her wrists, and he's holding her from behind, her arms crossed at her waist.

"A word to the wise, Ada," he says, pulling her against him and whispering into her ear: "Don't play with fire unless you are prepared to be burnt."

Ada's head is tipped backward, her neck tensed as though he is holding a knife to it. Her eyes are lidded, though, unconcerned, when she answers. "I'll try to keep it in mind."

His lips are smiling now; he inhales the scent of her perfume, and of something more dangerous and erotic that he recognizes as blood. "Good," he says. "Your death would be such a waste." Gently, he begins to nibble her neck, biting at the flesh with an intensity that is almost painful. When he notices her eyes flutter shut, he uncrosses her arms, spinning her around quickly so that they are face-to-face. He's playing rough, she tells herself. That's okay.

She can give as good as she gets.

He is kissing her breast, then her collarbone; the side of her neck; now the area behind her ear. He does something intricate with his tongue that makes her breath catch in her throat and it feels like an electric shock is rippling through her skin, making her blush, turning her knees weak.

"Like that?"

Her breathing is a little faster than it should be. "Hated it. Give me my hands back, Handsome?"

"Ask nicely," he says, bringing her wrist up to his mouth and kissing her palm.

"Please."

Wesker pivots, picking her up and slamming her against a wall. She spits hair out of her mouth as he pins her arms up by her head. The curve of her arm is delicate and beautiful, and he kisses her hard, pulling at her bottom lips with his teeth. He's still close enough that she can feel the heat of his breath when he whispers, "Now _beg_."

_She'd been light when he'd picked her up in his arms like a bride. Her face was pressed against his chest, and her lips were moving; when he'd paid attention, he'd realized that she was merely delirious, reliving a memory._

"_I wanted to escape with you," she was saying over and over. "Just let me die. I wanted to escape."  
_

_ Some nights she would whisper this refrain into a pillow while he sat by the window and smoked a rare cigarette, listening.  
_

_ It nearly killed him that he still did not know who the words were meant for._

* * *

­­­

_"Penthouse."__  
_

_"A dirty magazine?"  
_

_ "Penthouse, yeah."  
_

_ "How typical."  
_

_ "It's classy," Chris had defended to Jill as Alpha Team rumbled over the I-95 in a fifteen-passenger van. "Barry's got gay porn under _his _mattress."  
_

_ The coffee cup Barry had just finished draining had hummed past Jill's ear and hit Chris in the head. "Liar," came Barry's bass_._"It's Playboy."  
_

_ "Gay porn," Chris whispered behind his hand to Jill.  
_

_ "It's_ Play_boy, for Christ's sake. Fourth of July edition."_

No one knew about the book hidden between the mattress and the box spring of Chris' bed in Poughkeepsie. It was not, as he'd told the boys in S.T.A.R.S. when they had shared what they kept beneath their bedspreads, pornography. The old tome was too dog-eared, yellowed, tatty and battered to make out the gold-leaf stamped onto the spine, but the ink on the title page read in simple Sylfaen font "Grimm's Fairy Tales."

Early in his S.T.A.R.S. career, out on a recon mission in Riyadh, Chris had taken a shot to the arm. Wesker had used a switchblade to cut up strips of his polyvinyl sleeve and tied them like a tourniquet around the rookie's arm. Chris had spent the night slouched against a wall while Wesker sat beside him, cleaning his service piece with the scraps and asking him questions. "What's your favorite book?" he'd asked. Chris' head had been bowed, his injured left arm cradled in his right between his knees. When he didn't answer, Wesker had cuffed his cheek. The nylon of the fingerless weightlifter glove had been rough against Chris' skin, and the trainee's hand had twitched as if a housefly had landed on it; the spasm made pain explode through the injured arm.

"Jesus Christ," Chris had said fiercely, lips pulled back from his teeth in agony. "Jesus _fuck_---what? What the hellja hit me for?" His torso had rocked back and forth gently as he tried to ease the throbbing.

"It's important that you don't fall asleep," was the unapologetic response. By the time he'd repeated the question, the fire had lessened a bit and Chris had swallowed, head inclined against the wall as he listened.

"Grim--Grimm's Fairy Tales."

A few weeks later, after a helicopter had taken them back to the states, he'd discovered the slender volume that was now tucked beneath his mattress lying surreptitiously inside his desk at the R.P.D., wrapped up in brown paper.

It wasn't that Grimm's Fairy Tales was his favorite book so much as it was the only title he could remember, choking on dust in Saudi Arabia and tacky with his own blood. But he'd read the stories dutifully at the kitchen table---startled by the carnage in Cinderella, when the wicked stepsisters cut off parts of their heels to fit their feet into the glass slipper; disquieted by the ending of The Little Mermaid, when the protagonist died and became sea foam for all eternity, while the prince lived happily ever after.

Yet the tale that came to mind now, as he moved through the streets of Paraíso, the pale smoke that hung ankle-deep over the pavement parting around his legs, was Rapunzel. The blistering landscape of the city did not have much in common with the fairyland in which the fable was set, but the tall, sugar cane-white bell tower of Paraíso was so powerfully reminiscent of the fortress in the tale that Chris stubbed the tip of his boot against the ground when he saw it and stumbled slightly.

He motioned to Jill and jerked his head toward the campanile. Chris watched her eyes dart toward the tower and then back; she nodded.

His finger was slippery on the trigger of his gun as he walked sideways, quiet and crab-like, ignoring the squelches and crunches issuing from beneath the soles of his feet. When they reached the entrance, Chris pressed his back against the door to the bell tower, right hand gripping the handle while the left held his revolver, barrel pointed up into the night air. Jill silently took up her position on the other side, both hands on her gun as she gave him a short nod. Chris pulled the door open as Jill made a sweep of the cylindrical room with her pistol. He pirouetted in behind her, his back against hers as they cleared the premises. After a moment, she hesitated, then lowered her gun.

"Clear." She wiped her forehead with a shaky hand, breathing heavily, then added: "Olly olly oxen free clear."

"Olly olly oxen free?" Chris repeated, casting her a look over his shoulder.

"Tag, Chris. It's what you say in tag. So the others know it's safe to come out of hiding?"

Chris shook his head. "Never played tag."

"You never played tag."

"Nope."

She rolled her eyes, holstering her piece. "You're such a bore sometimes."

"Yeah," he scoffed, "No one's ever interested in zombies and espionage, but I'm sure they'd all be rapt if I told them a good, gripping story about tag." He put one hand on the door and swung it back and forth. "It's wood," he commented.

"Glad you're on top of things."

"Are the stairs wood too? Check, would you?"

"They're wood."

"Right, good. We're going to get up the stairs and burn them down, Jill. We'll be safe up in the bell tower if we can burn the stairs down."

Jill stared at the spiral staircase that wound around and around the tower, climbing to dizzying heights. "Have you got a plan on how to get down again once the steps are gone, there, MacGyver?"

"Magic carpet ride."

"Seriously, now."

"Of course I do," he said absently. He left the door swinging on its brass pintles and walked to where Jill was standing, holstering her firearm. "Here," he said as he unslung the rucksack and dangled it from its strap in front of her. "Your turn to carry the rations."

Jill stared at him, disbelieving, for a moment, the backpack swinging gently back and forth. Then she gave her head a little shake, meaning _"typical_," and grabbed the satchel from him. "Ever the gentleman," she groused, shrugging it on one shoulder.

Chris opened his mouth to reply, but the answer died in his throat: a dark figure had just moved outside the door to the tower, and he could suddenly smell something like rotten fruit. The figure was holding its arms up by its chest, its hands limp and flopping as though there were Marionette strings attached to its wrists. There was a rattling, phlegmy sound as it snuffled over the ground, staggering into the car frames and tires that littered the roadways.

And it wasn't alone.

"Jill," Chris said tensely. The mists carried his voice, and the thing looked up, eyes rheumy and seeping a clear liquid in the light from the embers. "_Run_," he urged her, pushing her toward the steps. "Up the stairs, up, quick!"

Chris tightened his finger on the trigger and the gun suddenly bucked in his hand, his ears ringing as the creature's head jerked back convulsively. But no sooner had the being fallen than another scuttled forward on all fours, and he lost count of the bullets swallowed by the legion of beasts silhouetted against the burning city. It took four hollow clicks before Chris realized the hammer was falling on an empty chamber, and he tucked the gun into the waistband of his pants with a "_Fuck_."

They were faster than he remembered. Faster, even, than the nightmares. Chris took two steps backwards and nearly tripped over the bottom stair. He spun around, the spare clips and grenades jingling on his belt, and hurtled up the stairway. His calves were burning and he could not feel his feet hitting the steps as he sped as fast as he could toward the landing. Ahead, he could see Jill reach the top and turn, the whites of her eyes gleaming. Had he been closer, he might have imagined he saw the reflection of the hellish scene in her pupils.

But he was not closer. He could not see the rotten hand close around his wrist, broken fingernails pressing into his skin. Chris was thrown off balance and stumbled, knees slamming painfully into the wood. And then there was another hand on his ankles, and something pulling at his hair.

Suddenly there was a bang and a flash of light as Jill's gun fired. He didn't count the flashes of light or the hollow brass casings that bounced off the granite landing, but one by one the hands loosened. It wasn't until the fifth or six shot that he felt a rush of cold on his neck and realized that something had been breathing on his skin. Chris wrenched away from the hands and clambered to the top, tugging a grenade from his belt as he went. He used his teeth to pull out the pin and lobbed it at the creatures, not waiting to see if he'd hit them before he put an arm around Jill's shoulders and pulled her against his chest to shield her from the explosion.

One glance backward was enough to fodder the nightmares that would continue to wake him, dank with sweat, for years to come. In the dreams, he would always see that sagging, black and haggard stairwell illuminated in the night by the flaming human bodies that tumbled as clawed at the wood and each other, their skin bubbling in the heat.

With a crash, the steps collapsed, and Chris could no longer tell what was wood or nails or charred bone. He looked away.

"Olly olly oxen free," he whispered.

- - - - - - - - - - -

The landing at the top of the bell tower was flat, and shoes had worn parts of the stones shiny. Dentils ringed the edges of the platform, which was bare except for a fat cord that dangled from the bell's clapper. Chris had tied a long rope to one of the dentils, explaining between grunts as he tightened the knots that it was an "emergency ladder."

It wasn't until the sunrise crested the Eastern horizon, iridescent and vague as the inside of a clam shell, that they finally tried to sleep---Chris with his hand tucked underneath his head and his face resting against the crook of his elbow; Jill on her stomach with her arms crossed beneath her cheek.

"Chris," Jill whispered before they fell asleep.

"Yeah?" Chris answered, lips rubbing against the skin of his arm as they moved.

"What are you thinking about?"

There was a long silence. Then Chris said, "School." He did not bother to open his eyes.

"_School_?" She repeated.

'Catholic school. I went to a Catholic school," he said. "They used to tell us stories."

"What kind of stories?"

"I mem—I remember this one called the Children of Fatima—F-Fateema? I don't know how to pronounce it."

"Never mind. How does it go?"

"It's about these three kids who said they saw Mary. Nineteen hundreds. Portugal, I think, or else Guatemala. I remember there's this one time they said Mary showed them a vision of hell. They said it was a lake of fire with all these demons and damned souls in it. Big, black demons like animals, I guess, and they'd, uh, fill the air with their shrieks. But it was the people that gave me nightmares when I was a kid, the souls. Their skin was brown, like decaying, and they were falling over each other in the fire and screaming. 'Never a'—how did they put it, again?—never an instant's peace or freedom from the pain,' I think is how it went."

There was a long silence. He thought she might have drifted off. Then: "They just couldn't tell you stories about Peter Cottontail, huh?"

He laughed, but his throat was dry and it caught a little. "I guess not," he said.

Before he fell asleep and relived the burning stairs in his nightmares for the first time, he was aware of a rustle of clothes, and then of Jill's gamine body pressed against his rib cage, the beating of her heart echoing his own. He was not fully awake when he put his arm around her, but he was aware of the unnerving sensation of feeling completely serene while the world fell apart around them.

* * *

**A/N: **Today, Classic Conditioning will be employed to compel readers to review upon seeing the "A/N" sign. Jokes aside, thanks for reading. Let me know what you think, or which characters you'd like to see more of. Everyone have a great day!  
**Alaska Kennedy:** Thanks for checking in. Sorry about these slow updates---as it is, I finished the rough copy of chapter three at five thirty this morning and then went to bed so I could have a power nap before my 8:00 a.m. class. I hope you enjoyed!  
**L.M. Avalon:** Haha--uh , sorry. I didn't realize I hadn't put any lines in. The mistake has been rectified--thanks for letting me know. I actually just finished reading "Beginnings," and I promise to leave a formal review when I get the time. Very impressive writing--especially for someone who [I'm guessing is a senior in high school.  
**Spartan175:** Thanks for the long review! Here is a relatively long chapter. Sorry there's no Claire in it--I originally had a scene with Leon and Claire in there, but I took it out so that the chapter wouldn't drag on and so that I'd have something to launch Ch. 4. I'll write twice as much about Leon and Claire next time to make it up to you. In the meantime, thanks for reading. Now look who's leaving the long review...:)  
**Subverted:** You're making me blush, now. After I read that you liked Wesker I sat down and rewrote the AdaxWesker scene. I hope you liked it. There's also some WeskerxChris friendship just to make things a bit more interesting. Thanks so much for the review!  
**Fenris Tyr:** Wow. That's probably the nicest review anyone's ever left me. I feel like I should pay you or something. :P Hope you liked chapter three and Happy Halloween.  
**Gasara:** Lotsa Chris indeed! Thanks so much for compliments . Hopefully, it'll take less time to finish chapter four; in the meantime, have a nice day!  
**HobbitGirl: **Thanks! I'm so glad someone likes the story. Hope you stay tuned!  
Loki 7000: I'm glad you liked it. I read your own stories after I read that you wanted to be a writer, and I have to admit that I was impressed with "Strength." Sorry I haven't left a review yet---pinky promise that I will :)  
**SteeleCratos: **Thanks, and BTW, interesting name. I sat for a good five minutes just staring at it. I think it's my favorite one yet. I'm relieved that someone likes my writing; hope you enjoyed this chapter. Peace back!  
**Ada Adore:** Just the person I wanted to talk to. What's up with Timeless? The opening chapter took my breath away! I'll be making my rounds later this week and leaving reviews on the stories I've read, but seriously...the only successful second-person narrative I've heard of is Bright Lights, Big City, and you blew that out of the water! 


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